Th and to bsn

Here is what I recommend:

1. Not for profit. I recommend schools whose mission is not to "make as much money for their owners as possible." I recommend schools that are not-for-profit and whose mission is to serve the public.

2. Accreditation. The school as a whole should be accredited by your regional accrediting agency -- and one of the national nursing accreditors. If in doubt, check the acreditations of a large, prestigious university in the same region. Your school should have the same ones.

3. Check out your state university system. Lots of the state university systems have strong (or at least OK) nursing programs that are relatively inexpensive and designed to serve the public. While it may not be the cheapest, fastest, easiest or the best ... you often get decent quality at a reasonable price at your state university.

4. Could you go to the campus and meet with the faculty/administration if you wanted to? While that might not be necessary, it can be helpful when problems arise. Sometimes, problems can be solved much more quickly and easily with a face-to-face meeting.

5. Do you know anyone who has gone to that school and can tell you the "inside scoop" on what it is like to be a student there? That can be very helpful as you go through the program.

6. Look closely at the curriculum and course requirements. Students often don't pay enough attention to that type of thing, wrongly assuming that all schools are pretty much alike. They are not alike. There is lots of variation. Do the courses look appealing to you? For example: if the assignments are all writing papers, and you hate to write papers, you won't be happy. How much clinical time will you need to put in and what type of clinical time? Is that realistic with your other commitments? Is the burden of any clinical experience, finding preceptors, etc. all on your shoulders or does the school help? Where will you be able to fulfill those commitments? Or do they have no clinical and everything is just "pretend"? Are you OK with that?

Explore all those things and that will narrow down your list of possible schools considerably.

And remember ... what you get out of school will depend on what you put into it.